


Patience

by Josselin



Series: Questions [2]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-13
Updated: 2016-03-06
Packaged: 2018-05-13 18:30:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5712712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Josselin/pseuds/Josselin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They began a habit of discussing their plans for the evening over breakfast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still in the process of writing this one, so WIP advisory! Thanks Tresa for encouraging me.

They began a habit of discussing their plans for the evening over breakfast. They breakfasted informally, in the small solar, where Laurent remembered sometimes eating with Auguste as a small child, when his father was not there to eat with them and the children were fed away from the hectic bustle of the court.

The small solar was in the domestic wing of the palace at Arles, with the other rooms reserved for the queen and intimate gatherings of the royal family. The solar was a small room, and had a sideboard on one wall spread with an embroidered cloth and food spread out on silver platters. The opposite wall was a window out over the gardens, with glass panes looking out on the greenery. The middle of the room was set with a table and two chairs.

In deference to Damen’s Akielon sensitivities, they dismissed the servants while they were eating. Laurent stared intently at his food; Damen did most of the talking.

Damen sketched in generalities a suggestion for the evening. He seemed to begin with the notion that they were untouched teenagers.

“Tonight we will only touch each other above the waist.”

Laurent narrowed his eyes. “I don’t think that is going to work.”

“Are you objecting?”

“No, by all means, let us stroke each others arms.”

The words, when he said them in the morning, were biting.

But the act, when evening came and they retired together, had a feeling of hesitance and reverence.

Damen offered to massage his shoulder--he knew how it pained Laurent, sometimes--and Laurent could feel that both of them were thinking back to that night in his tent on campaign when Damen had kneaded his shoulder for the first time.

Laurent closed his eyes and he could almost feel the atmosphere of the tent. The vague noises of men and horses muted beyond the tapestry cloth walls, the smoky smell of the brazier, the ever present sense of grit that accompanied being on campaign.

The warmth of Damen’s hand on his shoulder seemed almost as significant as it had that day so many months prior, as though the possibility of Damen’s treachery and the weight of all of the secrets between them were still heavy in the air.

The last time Damen had massaged his shoulder Laurent had been affected enough to offer the man his freedom. There was perhaps something about the simple touch that had the effect of a drug, because Laurent could feel something in his spine relax, and again he felt dangerously ready to offer Damen anything. 

He shifted, instead, and turned around to face Damen. He had to tilt his head up to look Damen in the eye when they stood this close together. He remembered distantly how much that had annoyed him when he had first had the slave delivered to his harem, but while the memory of the tent was oppressively close the memory of the harem was hazy and far off. 

Damen smiled at him when he turned. His hands still rested loosely on Laurent’s shoulders. Laurent raised his own hands to Damen and rested them on his shoulders. Damen was still wearing his jacket, and after a moment Laurent lifted his hands and turned them to the laces. 

“You are very adept at that,” Damen said, and Laurent closed his eyes for a breath. He told himself sometimes that Damen was not observant, but that was not it -- Damen observed, but Damen was simply too good, too pure, to put the pieces together.

Laurent did not want to think about that right now. “I want to touch you.” Laurent finished pulling the laces free and Damen shrugged the jacket off. He let it drop to a chair. Laurent ran his hands over Damen’s bared arms. He thought about offering a massage to Damen, but he was not certain he could look at the scars on Damen’s back while he did it. 

He took a deep breath. “I--you--” he found this harder to put to words. “I know that I do not deserve you,” he said.

Damen leaned down toward him and pressed their foreheads together lightly. “I tell myself the same thing.”

There was a long moment where the only noise was the mingled air of their breathing. 

“Come to bed,” Damen said, and he didn’t bother even to completely undress, but tugged Laurent toward the bed and pulled him into his arms. They collapsed in a messy arrangement that left Laurent’s head resting on Damen’s chest with Damen’s arm resting loosely next to him. Laurent could see the remaining golden wrist cuff in the dim moonlight from the window, and he thought perhaps he ought to see about having the other cuff made into something for himself.

Laurent awoke before Damen and slipped from the bed before Damen could stir. They were together again at breakfast. Laurent arrived early as the servants were still placing dishes out on the table, and he brushed away their apologies and focused his attention out the window while he waited. 

Laurent felt embarrassed, like a bruised fruit. It was shameful that the lightest affection and the weight of his own memory could undo him so, and that they were still in the middle of this ridiculous charade because he could not talk about how he wanted to be with Damen without losing his words and swooning like a virgin maid. 

Damen suggested that morning that they take turns touching one another alternately -- and still only above the waist, so it seemed a step back from the day before. The suggestion, the words seemed to come easily to Damen, as natural as the hearty appetite he had for the food on the table. And then the following day he offered to give Laurent a scalp massage, which did not sound intimate but left him collapsed in Damen’s lap like a purring cat afterwards. 

The following day Damen confessed to thinking back to when he had been Laurent’s manservant and helped him to undress, and Laurent let Damen undo all of the ties on his clothing and felt the warmth of Damen’s eyes on his body as his skin was revealed.

On the fifth morning, when they had spent almost a week in the childish charade and still not properly had sex, Laurent objected before Damen could put forth another idea.

“This is ridiculous. It is no better to stammer over what we might do in bed together over breakfast than it is in the dark. How long are we going to continue with no progress--“

Damen interrupted him. “It’s traditional in Akielos, for those who have slaves, to speak with the slave master in the morning.” One of Damen’s curls had recalcitrantly refused the direction Damen had combed his hair and was in disarray on his forehead. “I was told that we keep the tradition because it provides a sense of enjoyable anticipation, to plan in the morning and be able to reflect throughout the day on what is to come.”

Damen tilted his head slightly to one side. “Do you not find that?”

“That is not what I said--”

“Have you not enjoyed the time we’ve spent together this last week?” 

“We haven’t even--”

“But did you enjoy it?” Damen pressed.

“That’s not the point--” and Laurent trailed off with his thought. Damen did not even have to say anything, his eloquently raised eyebrow was sufficient.

“If you are not enjoying our time together,” said Damen, “then I want to know so that we can try something different. But if you are enjoying yourself, then give me another week.” He leaned in toward Laurent over the table. “Give us another week.”

Laurent conceded.


	2. Chapter 2

The next few days followed much of the same pattern. One evening, as they were relaxing quietly in Laurent’s chambers after one of Damen’s touching exercises, Laurent poured a goblet of water from a table near the bed. He climbed back on to the bed and offered it to Damen before he drank himself.

Damen smiled sweetly, as though a goblet of water were a particularly significant gift. Damen seemed to take for granted the huge things, such as his own ongoing presence in Arles supporting Laurent’s position, and to give little actions of kindness an inflated sense of worth.

“Sometimes,” Damen said, tracing a finger around the lip of the goblet and looking intently at Laurent. “I think that your past lovers might not have been particularly considerate.”

Laurent had been reaching to take the goblet back; he could see his hand twitch in the air. He pressed it down against the bedclothes, instead. “You might say that,” he said. Damen would have had to have been deaf to not hear the ice in his tone, but Damen did not seem affected. 

Damen handed the goblet back to Laurent, and either didn’t notice that Laurent’s hand was still shaking or kindly didn’t comment on it. Damen relaxed back on the bed, tucking one of his arms under his head.

“I know that we did not begin well,” said Damen, looking up at the canopy at the top of the bed frame. “How I touched you in the baths--it was presumptuous. I don’t mean--”

“That has nothing to do with how we did not begin well,” said Laurent.

Damen rolled on to his side slightly to look at Laurent more closely. “It wasn’t--”

“One of us was in control of what happened in the baths and it certainly wasn’t you,” said Laurent, sitting up straighter.

Damen sat up next to him. His posture was tense as well. “It was my fault.”

“No. It was a trap,” said Laurent. “I construed for my uncle to leave so that I could spring the trap on you, and you fell into it precisely as I expected. If you hadn’t done what you did, I had been prepared to go further.”

Damen’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean by that?”

“It wouldn’t have had to have been my word only,” said Laurent. “If you had struck me, or done something that would have left a bruise or a mark--”

Damen was beginning to look angry; there were lines on his forehead. “You set up a plan where the goal was to get yourself hit?”

He had not been sure, when he had formulated the plan, whether Damen would turn toward violence or sex, and he had been prepared for either, but it did not seem that bringing that up now would improve Damen’s mood. “My guards were only steps away--”

“But why would you--”

Laurent dropped the goblet. It felt to the bed softly and didn’t make a noise, but it spilled out water over the disrupted bedclothes in a river. Both of them stopped speaking to look down at it for a moment.

“My point,” said Laurent, “Is that it was my fault, I know that, and I know that I cannot make up for it--”

“We are both at fault.”

Laurent drew a deep breath. “Fine. If it makes you feel better to agree that we are both at fault, fine.”

The lines on Damen’s forehead relaxed. “It does make me feel better,” he said.

Laurent closed his eyes for a moment. “That’s because you’re an excessively honorable barbarian.”

Damen reached in between them for the goblet, and set it on the floor beside the bed. He eyed the wet bedclothes and then attempted to mop up as much of the water as he could with the sheet, and then pulled it off the bed and let it fall to the floor also. 

Laurent felt twenty steps behind; he hated how Damen was the one person who always made him feel that way. 

“I’m cold,” said Laurent, objecting to the removal of the sheet.

“Come closer,” Damen suggested, and they managed to make it through the rest of the night without arguing. 

After that, Laurent tolerated several more evenings without climax before he lost his patience yet again. The following morning, he presented an idea. 

Damen seemed excited by Laurent’s announcement that he had come up with an idea. Laurent had not, overall, been as engaged in this scheme as Damen might have wished, and Damen likely took Laurent contributing an idea as a sign he had more faith in the entire exercise. But when Laurent announced what the idea was, Damen’s face fell.

“Drugs,” Damen said. His voice was flat.

“It’s not as though we haven’t taken them before,” said Laurent. 

Laurent should have thought of it sooner. His problem was that he was too caught up in his own head -- he knew there was a drug that made it easier to escape that and to focus only on the scent of Damen standing next to him. He hadn’t liked that side effect of the drug when he’d been poisoned, but it could certainly be put to better use now, and if he were able to stop thinking and just enjoy himself, even for one night, then hopefully Damen would not soon give up on him. 

Damen was quiet for a long time. Laurent moved his eggs around on his plate. 

“No,” Damen said finally. 

“No?” Laurent looked up from his food. 

“I don’t want to.”

“You’ve taken it before.”

Damen nodded, a slow acknowledgement. Then, as though it were a separate thought: “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

Laurent raised an eyebrow, inviting him to elaborate.

“I remember your reaction, to the drug. You didn’t like it.”

“They were trying to kill me,” said Laurent.

“I don’t think that was the only reason you disliked it,” said Damen, once again all too insightful without being able to put all of the pieces together. 

Laurent let the idea drop. “Are we back to keeping our trousers on and touching above the waist?”

But no, Damen had a new idea, which involved silk ties and Damen’s wrists, and that was the best idea yet.


	3. Chapter 3

They did not do anything especially elaborate with the lengths of silk that Damen produced. Damen stretched out on Laurent’s bed, rested his wrists comfortably on the pillow above his head, and then watched as Laurent wrapped the silk around his wrists together several times. Laurent did not bother tying the ends, just left them loose on the pillow, and enjoyed the contrast of the bright green silk against the dark strands of Damen's curled hair. 

"You could just unwind this," said Laurent.

"Yes." Damen had moved his eyes from the silk on his wrists to be focused now on Laurent's face above him. 

It seemed imprudent, however, after the number of times that Laurent had actually arranged for Damen to be bound effectively in front of him, to suggest further restraints. "Keep your hands here," he said, pressing them against the pillow, and if he had not been watching Damen's face very closely he might have missed the widening of Damen's pupils at that remark. 

The silks left Laurent free to focus on pleasuring Damen, which they both already knew that he preferred, and he liked the helpless way that Damen occasionally flexed his shoulders or lifted his arms before remembering that he was not permitted. Damen seemed to enjoy it also, but then, Damen seemed oddly content with almost everything that they did. 

They mutually decided the following morning that silks were an enjoyable addition to their repertoire, and that they would return to them again in the future. There was no mention of tying Laurent's hands, and the notion that Laurent did not find this idea appealing existed between them as an unspoken understanding.

The following day the weather had turned warm, and the sun beat down on Arles with unusual fervor. It seemed oddly appropriate because it was a day that had been designated for an Akielon style entertainment, and the weather seemed to be showing its own Akielon spirit as the hastilude proceeded. It was as though even the weather cooperated with Damen's desire to strip without clothing, oil himself, and wrestle with other men in the ring, Laurent speculated to himself.

Laurent spent some time in the afternoon watching the entertainments. He sipped water laced with fruit and listened to the Veretian courtiers relaxing under the same awning murmur about the events and the participants. It was different than seeing pets fight in the ring, they said. Barbaric and yet oddly titillating. 

Damen good naturedly succumbed to his men's urging to participate personally in several of the events, but after a few rounds he disappeared from the ring and from the seating assembled around it, and Laurent found himself losing interest and he excused himself from the stands and returned to the palace by way of the stables. 

Laurent had not been expecting Damen to reach out for him from a concealed corner near the tack room, and he almost screamed before he realized the identity of the man whose hand was on his arm and caught the intensity of Damen's gaze. 

Damen drew him into the corner he had found in the stable. It was not a large space, and Damen drew him close. In the confines of the space they were pressed against each other. It came to Laurent's attention that Damen had not put on significantly more clothing after he had left the ring.

Damen rested one hand on Laurent's shoulder and raised another to his face. 

"Can I --" Damen said. "Will you --" and whatever he found in Laurent's face must have sufficed as an answer, because Damen leaned in and their lips met.

The kiss had a different heat to it than the warm embers of the affection in their recent encounters. This was the same flame that had sparked on the battlements at Ravenel. The flame danced between them in the kiss, and the kiss was breathless and messy and disorganized. Laurent nipped at Damen's bottom lip and Damen moaned appreciatively. Damen ran his hands through Laurent's hair and then shifted his grip to pull Laurent closer to him, aligning their bodies without space between.

They were too close for Laurent to see Damen's eyes. His view, when he opened his eyes, was of Damen's ear, and the sweat-damped curls of his hair. Laurent's back was pressed up against the wooden wall of the stable. He felt completely consumed by Damen, caught between the strength of his body and the wall behind him, immersed in Damen's scent, the warmth of his skin even hotter than the crush of the unusually warm sun.

When Damen spoke, he breathed warmly on Laurent's neck. 

"Please," Damen said, "Will you -- is it all right --"

Damen used gestures to demonstrate what it was he seemed beyond being able to put in words, clasping one of Laurent's hands and then guiding it to the ties of the trousers he must have pulled on after the match.

Laurent undid the ties deftly with one hand; Damen moved his lips along Laurent's jawline. He stroked Damen deftly, quickly -- this did not seem a time for artistry or teasing.

"Can you?" Damen started.

Laurent made an encouraging noise. 

"Talk to me."

And that made Laurent laugh, low in his throat. His laughter, judging by Damen's reaction, had the same effect as his voice, which Damen had requested. "Is that what you like?" he said, and his tone could have been mocking but he found it came out gentle instead. "Do you like my voice in your ear?"

"Yes," Damen said, and Laurent suspected from his expression and the tense sound of his voice that he was very close.

"Do you like it better in your own language?" Laurent asked, switching to Akielon for novelty, and perhaps Damen did like that better, for he finished with a cry that wasn't comprehensible in either of their languages. 

Laurent stroked him gently through it, and raised his other hand to the back of Damen's neck, which was resting on Laurent's shoulder. He laughed again, lightly. This changed all of the rules, he thought. 

Damen shifted his weight slightly, leaning back far enough that the two of them were able to kiss again. The kiss was not the same flame of the minutes before. The embers were banked, and it was warm but yet somehow appreciative and comforting, rather than desperate. 

"I was thinking of you in the ring," said Damen after a moment, in Akielon. "You were sitting there, sipping that beverage with lime as though you were cool and relaxed and completely unaffected, and yet you were completely in my thoughts--"

Laurent found he liked this type of confession very much. 

"I was not," he admitted, "completely unaffected."

Damen made a pleased sound and leaned in to kiss him again. 

"Is there anything I can do for you?" said Damen. 

Laurent shook his head. 

"I did not realize this was permitted as part of our arrangement," said Laurent. 

"Whatever we wish is permitted," Damen murmured. "Did I displease you--"

"No, the opposite," said Laurent. 

He had not been able to put it to words, he realized. He had not even articulated the thought to himself. But he realized now that he had worried, somehow, that all of the planning turned to the sexual encounters together would reduce them in some fashion. That it left no room for spontaneity or for true passion, or for the kind of overcome feeling he often found that Damen left him with. So Damen's desperation was reassuring, a statement that he still desired with the same kind of passion. And that he still desired Laurent in particular, given his remarks about his thoughts in the ring and his effort to seek Laurent out afterwards, when he could have satisfied himself with any of a dozen others. 

In the spirit of the honesty that had led Damen to confess his thoughts, Laurent spoke. “I like that you were thinking of me.” He spoke Akielon; it seemed more intimate, somehow. “I like that you were thinking of me, and I like that you sought me out, and I like that you like my voice.”

“You are going to rouse me again.”

Laurent said, “I like that also.”


	4. Chapter 4

The idea of writing a letter about his desires for Damen in the bedroom had seemed laughable when Damen had first proposed it. But when Laurent was left sitting at his desk, parchment and ink near at hand, dispensed with the day’s business and thinking aimlessly about what came next, the idea of the letter seemed to have more and more appeal.

He could throw it in the fire, he told himself, and the idea that he did not have to share it with Damen gave him the courage to start writing it.

_I am frightened --_

He paused for a moment, thinking. What was it he was frightened of, exactly? He wasn’t frightened of Damen, and yet --

_I am frightened of who I am when I am with you. I wish to please you very much, and I am not accustomed to putting so much of myself into the goodwill of another. In the past --_

He paused again, chewing on his lip, and then thought, ‘I am throwing it in the fire, after all,’ and continued.

_When I have held others in such esteem in the past they have disappointed me, and I am worried that it is something about me that disappoints them._

_It seems easier to me to simply tell you to find another lover. There are dozens you could have if you merely snapped your fingers. And yet, I want you with such a jealous envy that I do not think I could watch._

_But I cannot become the lover that you deserve. My confidence did not falter in this manner when I was training in swordsmanship. I picked up my weapon every time that I dropped it because I believed that I could be better than Auguste, better than you._

_And yet, in this, I concede that you are my superior._

_I am unaccustomed to skills that are so challenging for me to master. I find myself at a loss. I am not certain that I have the patience to endure. I find myself certain that you will not have that patience. And so we are only prolonging the ending, and I am not certain that I can endure that either._

He stared at the page for a long moment; his thoughts far off, planning. If he had anticipated Damen -- so many of his last minute plans began with that thought. But if he had anticipated Damen better, he would have planned for this longer ago. He would have taken a lover, or a pet perhaps. An older pet, one grateful enough for Laurent to buy out his contract that he could have been persuaded to be discreet. Laurent could have practiced in the same manner he practiced with the sword, and perhaps he could have established more of a sense of himself by this point.

Perhaps he ought to send Damen away with the same goal. If Damen went to Ios, or on a tour through Vask and fathered a thousand curly-haired babies, and then Laurent could take a pet in the interim. He forced himself to think through the pets at court for likely candidates and the idea was so repulsive that he could not even settle on a short list.

Laurent was so caught up in his thoughts that he did not notice Damen entering the room until Damen was right behind him, brushing a light kiss over the top of his head. 

“Are you still working?”

Laurent started, and then crumpled the parchment in front of him in his fist in a terribly obvious way, and then flushed as he realized he would have been far better off behaving casually and diverting Damen’s attention.

Damen rested one hip on the desk next to Laurent and raised an eyebrow at the paper in his hand. 

“Secrets?” he said. “Knowing you, I would have guessed a cipher and at least four separate codes.”

Laurent could still feel his own heart racing from the surprise of Damen coming up behind him. 

“It is not political,” he said, feeling that he had to explain in some fashion.

“A love letter?” said Damen, teasing. 

Laurent could feel his face redden again. The fire crackled at the other end of Laurent’s study, and he was tempted to throw the paper into the fire. He was tempted to hand the paper to Damen.

“Yes.”

Damen raised his eyebrow again, so Laurent had managed to surprise him with that.

Honesty was generally effective with Damen. “I was not yet finished writing it,” he said. “And I had not yet decided if I wanted to show it to you.”

Damen smiled. “So it is to me?”

“Yes.”

Damen leaned in toward Laurent again but made no move toward the paper in his lap. Instead, Damen brushed another affectionate kiss over the top of his head. “Good,” said Damen.

“What would you do if it were to someone else?” 

“Challenge him to a duel,” said Damen. Damen’s tone was warm, intimate in the small space between them, and yet there was a core of steel to it.

Laurent smoothed the crumpled paper between his hands and closed his eyes for a moment. He thought again about throwing it in the fire. He handed it to Damen.

Damen looked at Laurent closely, inspecting his face for something, and then he accepted the letter. Damen kept his eyes on Laurent a moment longer.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt you,” said Damen. “You can finish.”

Laurent shook his head.

Damen moved his eyes from Laurent’s face to the paper. He read over it, slowly. Laurent watched Damen’s eyes scan over the words. Damen finished, looked up and looked Laurent in the eye again, and then looked down and seemed to read over it a second time.

Damen set the letter down on the desk, and turned his eyes to Laurent. He pushed himself off the edge of the desk, and Laurent had a moment of terror -- this was it, Damen was going to leave -- and then Damen got down on his knees in front of where Laurent was sitting.

“Marry me,” Damen said.

“What?”

“Share my confidence that we can find our way together.”

“But, I can’t --” said Laurent.

“I know you prefer to have a plan, and that in this circumstance all of your plans are failing you. Trust to me.”

Laurent had to look away from Damen’s face.

“Marry me,” Damen said again. “Write me a letter every morning. Look at me with tenderness and let me show you that we can be wonderful together.”

“I know we can,” said Laurent. “We--you--we already--”

“Will you?” said Damen. He reached out a hand toward Laurent. Laurent could see the letter sitting on the table in his left field of vision and Damen’s outstretched hand and hopeful face in his right.

Laurent raised his own hand to meet Damen’s.

“I -- need to think,” he said.

Damen nodded, and stood again next to him. “I’ll let you finish working,” he said, and he brushed his fingers over the back of Laurent’s hand as he left.

Laurent stared at the letter on the desk in front of him, and then he got up and threw it in the fire.


	5. Chapter 5

The following day, half of the court left Arles on a hunting expedition. When Damen came to see Laurent, Damen was already dressed for riding in traditional Veretian fashion, his jacket laced up the front.

“You’re not coming,” said Damen. 

“There is too much to do here.”

“I could stay to help,” said Damen. 

Laurent shook his head. 

Damen gazed at him for a long moment, probably thinking something ridiculously chivalrous. Damen nodded. “I will miss you.”

“It’s only a few days,” said Laurent. 

“Still.” Damen reached and caressed Laurent’s hand briefly. “I will think of you, while I am gone,” Damen said. He brushed a finger over the back of Laurent’s hand. “Perhaps you will think of me also?”

Laurent reached for the laces of Damen’s jacket and retied them where they were tangled. “I will miss you also,” he acknowledged, and the warmth of Damen’s smile lingered with him even after Damen had left. 

He retired that evening to his chambers and thought on Damen’s parting comment about thinking of him. He thought of Damen often--he found it hard to keep Damen from his thoughts. He didn’t think, however, that the small ways in which he tried to anticipate Damen were what Damen had meant with his suggestion Laurent think of him.

Damen had meant for Laurent to think of him in bed. He had promised Laurent that he would fill his own mind with Laurent as he pleasured himself, and he had intended for Laurent to do the same. 

The whole business felt a bit ridiculous to Laurent as he climbed into his own bed with no night clothes. It felt strange to retire naked without Damen there to distract him. 

He attempted to fill his thoughts with Damen instead, as directed. Touching himself while thinking of something else was not a practice with which Laurent had a great deal of familiarity. He took himself in hand and brutally told himself that this was not something that should tax his intellectual capacities, and began.

It felt as though his mind took some time to settle. It were as though his thoughts were a churned pool of water, and the silt would not settle to the bottom of the puddle until the water had quieted.

Laurent told himself that no one else ever had to know what he thought about. 

He thought first about Damen. He was vaguely relieved that Damen was gone, and that he could have some time alone to think--to let the silt settle--and yet he missed Damen at the same time. He tried to think of Damen in a physical way, and turned his mind to Damen’s body. He liked the way Damen looked; he liked the way that Damen looked at him.

Laurent told himself that fantasizing was supposed to be about things that he enjoyed. He enjoyed Damen. He enjoyed being king. How could he combine those.

_I could fuck Damen on my throne,_ he thought, and that seemed a thought worth exploring.

He tried to imagine it. The throne was wooden, and had an elaborately carved back and arms. The back was engraved with the starburst emblem of the kingdom, and the arms with various scenes of Laurent’s ancestors defeating their enemies. The enemies were probably Akielons, Laurent realized. The seat was covered with a velvet cushion, but it was still not comfortable. It was impossible to not sit up straight, because the carved back was not at all pleasant to lean against, and it was even difficult to drape one’s arms over the armrests, because they too were uncomfortably carved. 

Laurent couldn’t picture a position on the throne that was pleasurable. Perhaps if Damen was on his knees in front of the throne--Laurent examined that idea in his head for a moment and discarded it.

Perhaps he should have a new throne made. It would be more convenient for fucking if there were no arm rests, and instead of the carved hardwood, he could instruct the craftsmen to cover it with padding and velvet upholstery. One of the renowned Veretian cloth merchants was sure to have something suitable. The new throne would have to be wide enough to accommodate Damen’s bulk and the spread of his shoulders, Laurent thought. Laurent started to design the throne in his head, thinking about proportions and how to make it comfortable to be seated upon while still fitting elegantly in with the rest of the decor in the throne room.

He realized suddenly that he was stroking himself while intently designing furniture in his head, and felt ridiculous. He was supposed to be thinking of his lover. 

Damen should be seated on the throne, Laurent decided. Laurent could be on top of him, which would be better. The seat was wide enough that he could rest his knees on the cushion, with his thighs spread wide over Damen’s lap. Less awkwardness than trying to fit Damen in otherwise, and Laurent enjoyed the way sitting on Damen’s lap let him look down into Damen’s face, which was not otherwise an angle he could achieve.

He could picture the way that Damen might look up at him if they were in that position, and he started to feel aroused. He cast his inner eye around the rest of the scene. He had pictured, without much thought, that they were in the Veretian throne room at Arles, so as the Laurent in his mind turned to see the rest of the room, it was filled with his uncle’s assembled Veretian council. Jeurre was regarding him with a vaguely contemptuous expression. Herode looked intrigued. 

Perhaps the moment was some sort of contrived display of Laurent's power, he thought. Damen dressed up in that ridiculous gold paint that Radel had used on him, wearing the collar that had showed Laurent’s possession, and--

He stopped. He was not aroused, and this was not pleasurable. 

He had the vague wonder of why other men seemed so enamored of this practice. He knew from talk in the barracks of its popularity, he knew from whispered comments about himself-- _once every ten years_ \--that he was the oddity. He had walked in on Damen taking himself in hand, even, and Damen had Akielon sensibilities about such matters. But once back when Damen was his manservant and they shared a tent, and Laurent had pretended he hadn’t glanced over at Damen’s pallet, and then once they were lovers, when Damen had simply beckoned Laurent over to join him with a smile.

He abandoned touching himself and focused on thinking of Damen. Damen hadn’t explicitly said for Laurent to touch himself, after all. His tone had implied it, but what he had said was that he hoped Laurent would think of him, and Laurent did not need to do anything more than direct his thoughts to do that.

Laurent asked himself what other things he enjoyed. 

There was a feeling that sometimes came over him while was fighting. When his opponent was very good, and Laurent was near to victory, he enjoyed that moment when his opponent realized that Laurent was going to win, and Laurent could see the realization come over him in his eyes. Laurent stretched slightly on the bed. Yes, he enjoyed that moment. It was especially sweet when his opponent had doubted him.

But he was supposed to be thinking of Damen--he could be fighting Damen. This seemed promising as a direction for his thoughts. It was physical, after all. He could easily feel the weight of the sword in his arms, the feeling of strength he had in his body when he moved all in alignment with the weapon, the visceral thrill when he could tell that his victory was assured. He could easily imagine fighting Damen. Damen’s Akielon style of movement, the strength of his blows as Laurent blocked. Laurent imagined seeing that recognition of Laurent’s victory in Damen’s eyes--

He blinked open his eyes, suddenly uncertain. He looked at the bed canopy over his head, and then closed his eyes again, deliberately returning to the fighting ring he’d conjured in his head.

He choreographed the fight between himself and Damen again. Then a third time. Then a fourth, trying another move that Damen would probably call a dirty Veretian trick, and yet the end result of the fight in his head was still a victory for Damen. He continued until he had imagined a half-dozen variations and each time it ended with Damen victorious.

Laurent sighed. Perhaps Damen would win. What would happen then. He pictured the look of victory in Damen’s eyes, instead. It wasn’t the same as the recognition of defeat expression that Laurent enjoyed. Damen took victory for granted, his expression when he realized he would win against Laurent was the same expression of calm determination that he had throughout a fight. There was no doubt in Damen’s face that he was going to win and he would always win. 

Laurent shifted slightly in the bed, feeling antsy somehow.

Fine, Damen won. Then what. Damen would make Laurent drop his weapon, his sword on the ground in the ring. And then Laurent would fall to his knees--

He stopped, feeling dissatisfied. 

He felt angry, also. He didn’t like that this was so difficult, and that something that other men talked about as though it were a pleasant walk through a garden was for him more akin to a treacherous climb along the edge of a cliff. He wished it could be easy for him the way it seemed to be for Damen. 

It should be simple. He should not be so easily distracted by all of these other thoughts. His enjoyment should not be so easily tainted. He should be able to think pleasant thoughts and enjoy them and have no further complications. He just needed something easy that didn’t require so much thought.

It would be easier, perhaps, if he were captured.

If Damen had actually thrown Laurent over the back of his horse when Laurent had teased about that. Been less honorable than he actually was and taken Laurent as a hostage and ran for Akielos. 

When they had joked about it Laurent had asked if he’d get on with Nikandros of Delfeur, but they had both known that wasn’t actually how it would have gone. If the lost king showed up in Delfeur with a hostage as valuable as Laurent, there would be no question that the hostage would be carefully guarded and kept close to the king at all times. Damen was smart enough to not take any chances with that.

Damen knew Laurent, also, and knew how easily he freed himself when a captive in the Vaskian foothills, so Damen would be careful with his prisoner. He would keep Laurent tied and gagged and carefully watched. It would be no easy thing to escape Damen.

Well, except Damen was foolish sometimes. Laurent was sure that he could spin a story that Damen would agree to--except he didn’t want to escape. He was trying to think about being captured. He told himself that escape was not an option. 

Damen had become clever, and no amount of Laurent’s pleading eyes would cause him to relent and take off the gag, even if Laurent pretended that he was in need of water. Damen would have a deaf manservant who was the only one who could feed Laurent, and Damen himself supervised the process from outside of hearing distance.

The rest of the time, Damen kept him tied to a post in his tent. The knots were strong and Laurent had already tested them for weaknesses. Damen wasn’t always there, and sometimes there was nothing to except wait for Damen to return.

He found himself relaxing into the idea of being forced to wait for Damen to come back. He couldn’t do anything until Damen returned, and he knew that Damen would return, and it was simply about counting the moments and watching the flicker of the lamp and--

\--perhaps he could contrive to knock over the lamp. If he extended his leg there was possibly a cushion within reach. Damen had been careless because what could Laurent do with a cushion when tied to a pole. But Laurent could aim the cushion in the direction of the lamp, and if he had the aim right, the tent flap might catch fire, and in the chaos of the king’s tent on fire--

No. He couldn’t escape. He didn’t want to escape. He was waiting for Damen to return. Perhaps he needed Damen for something so there was no point in trying to flee. What could he need Damen for? His armies? His sword? Both? Something of that nature. 

Damen might not return right away. The anticipation was delicious. The pleasure of waiting alone in the tent crept over him like the warmth of a fire on a cool evening. 

Laurent began to feel that he might possibly become aroused by this idea. It was better than the scenario with the throne, or the one with the sword fighting.

He lingered in the idea, thinking about the moments of the waiting, wondering, watching the door of the tent and listening for Damen’s footsteps. Watching the light dim as it became dusk, and then evening, and then night. The lamp flickered as it ran out of oil and then went out, and Laurent was alone in the darkness. He thought about his breathing, and it was calm and even, measured.

He felt pleasantly adrift and near to sleep, both in the dream of waiting in the tent and in actuality in his bed in Arles.

He was not ready to sleep yet, though. He turned his thoughts to what might happen when Damen returned.

Damen was foolish and would probably feel bad for leaving his slave tied for so long. He might remove the gag and untie Laurent and offer him water and massage his shoulders from the awkward position.

Then Laurent would have to talk to him, to convince him of whatever came next in the plan. That they should negotiate with Enguerran, probably. That Laurent was worth more as an ally than as a hostage. 

Perhaps Damen was clever enough not to take off the gag. Damen came in, had a servant relight the lamp. He went about his work in the tent as though Laurent weren’t tied to a pole in the middle of the space. The feeling Laurent had was similar to when he was waiting for Damen to return, except almost better, because Damen was already there, and Laurent could keep his eyes on Damen while he waited.

Some of Damen’s men came in and interrupted his reading of his correspondence. The Akielon soldiers were well behaved enough that they pretended not to notice Laurent tied up in the middle of the tent. Damen took their reports and issued his orders for them, and the men saluted. 

Laurent thought about trying to signal one of them. To get the attention of even one of the men, pique someone’s interest so that he might return when Laurent were alone and take off the gag and then Laurent could use him to convince the man to aid in his escape--

No, he told himself firmly. 

Perhaps he could go back to when he was alone in the tent. Or he could forget the tent. Damen could take him back to Ios and install Laurent in his harem permanently. Damen could build a special new gilded cage for his new pet. And in Akielos it would be hot. The slaves went naked, and they were responsible for feeding their masters.

Laurent wouldn’t be given any clothes, and he’d go around bare the way he was on the sheets of his bed in Arles. He shifted slightly in the bed and felt his skin against the fabric. He would serve Damen cool drinks in the heat, and if he were well behaved Damen might offer him a taste. Laurent was certain he could be very well behaved. He could lower his head, and curl at Damen’s feet, and kiss Damen’s calf. 

He would serve Damen in the baths, of course. Then Damen would be naked also. Laurent had heard from a trader that in Akielos the royal bathes were renowned for their beauty and gorgeous mosaic tiles.

But thinking of washing Damen in the famed Akielon baths suddenly made Laurent think of the time that he and Damen had actually been in the Veretian baths together, and he lost interest. He let the thread of thought he had been following drop, and he felt disgusted with himself. Why was he fantasizing about being an Akielon slave, anyway. It was a ridiculous notion. He might as well go get his earrings out of the dresser and curl his hair. 

Laurent gave up on trying to fantasize. He curled himself around one of Damen’s pillows--it still smelled slightly of Damen himself--and he went to sleep.


End file.
